


And Maybe

by orphan_account



Category: Bandom, Panic At The Disco
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-04-29
Updated: 2009-04-29
Packaged: 2017-10-02 20:28:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Maybe he looks, and maybe he starts thinking what-if-what-if, and maybe there comes a day when he stops thinking "what-if" and starts thinking "maybe," and maybe there comes a day when he stops thinking "maybe" and starts thinking "yes."</p>
            </blockquote>





	And Maybe

**Author's Note:**

> TITLE: And Maybe
> 
> RATING: NC17 (for language and mild sexual content)  
> PAIRING: Spencer/Brendon
> 
> WORD COUNT: 6500-ish
> 
> DISCLAIMER: Not real. Don't google yourself, and if you do, don't tell me you're here.
> 
> A/N: No idea, guys, I kind of accidentally wrote this last night. The idea might look familiar to some of you who may have seen my post about trying to foist off some bunnies, but...*shrug.* No one took this one, and eventually it won the battle, so here it is. Thanks to Lib and Barmy for phone betas, as always. *loves*

The thing about being in a room with Pete Wentz and Ryan Ross at the same time is that the conversation is always going to go down one of two paths: intellectually incomprehensible, or wistfully emotional.

  
Tonight is a wistfully emotional night.

 

"God." Pete smiles, amused and maybe even a little embarrassed. It's a strange look on Pete. "It was Patrick for me. Years and _years _I pined."

 

"Mmm." Across the room, Brendon is sprawled on one side of the couch, his beer bottle dangling loosely from his fingers. "I feel you, man."

 

Ryan snorts a laugh. "God, yeah. How long did it _take _you to get over the Spencer thing, anyway?"

 

Spencer's head snaps up. "What—?" he starts to say, but Brendon is already grinning at Ryan, sheepish.

 

"Four years? Give or take?" He shakes his head. "I'm nothing if not persistent, I guess."

 

Ryan and Pete laugh, and even Jon is smiling. Spencer, though. Spencer is in shock. 

 

"What Spencer thing?" he finally manages to demand, staring at Brendon.

 

"_Spencer."_  Ryan laughs incredulously. "You can't seriously not have noticed it. It was the most obvious crush in the history of mankind. Uh. Sorry, Brendon."

 

Brendon waves a rueful hand, smiling and shrugging as if to say, _Nah, that's fair_. 

 

"Dude, Spencer didn't even know?" Pete demands, laughing. "God, I was _way _worse than you, trust me—Patrick totally knew. It was completely ridiculous. I was giving the guy lyrics to love songs about himself, it was that bad."

 

Ryan, Brendon, and Jon all laugh, but Spencer still hasn't moved past the "Spencer thing" comment. His stomach is doing something weird, halfway between knotting up and swimming around, and his face feels hot and scratchy like he’s blushing even though he’s way too stunned for embarrassment right now.

 

"You seriously had a crush on me?" he asks.

 

Brendon smiles at him, his expression odd and almost wistful. "Oh, it was so much worse than that, man. There were, like. _Feelings. _Head-in-the-clouds, walking-on-air, stupid-in-love kinds of feelings. Picket fences, Cambodian babies, all that shit. I was head over heels, dude, it was pretty pathetic. I can't believe you really didn't know. Everybody knew. I'm pretty sure your _mom _knew."

 

For some reason, Spencer’s heart is clenching. He’s…speechless. 

 

Brendon seems to take that as an indictment. "Hey, don't get weird about it now, okay? It was a long time ago, I'm totally over it now, I promise." He smiles, a little nostalgically. "Hurt like a bitch for awhile, though."

 

"Hear, fucking hear." Pete raises his beer bottle in a toast in Brendon's direction.

 

"Yeah, what happened with that?" Ryan wonders. "Like. What finally killed it off?"

 

"Ashlee," says Pete. "I mean, I'll always have a soft spot for Patrick, but it's not like it was, now that I've got Ash and Bronx. Thank god for that. I don't know how much longer he would have put up with me."

 

Spencer is barely even paying attention. He still can't wrap his head around ‘_head-in-the-clouds, walking-on-air, stupid-in-love kinds of feelings.’ _ How did he never know about this?

 

Brendon seems unaware of the bomb he’s just dropped into the middle of Spencer’s world. "You’re lucky,” he tells Pete. “I just had to get over it by myself. It sucked. Mostly I just tried not to think about it, and tried not to think about it, and eventually I didn't have to try so hard anymore. You know?"

 

"How—I can't believe..." Spencer feels like an idiot, but he can't let it go. "I seriously—_four years?"_

 

"Pretty much from the very first day," Ryan confirms, amused.

 

"The second day, actually," Brendon admits, rueful. He’s looking at Spencer again, easy and affectionate, and whatever he may have felt in the past, he doesn’t look like someone who’s pining right _now. _"He didn't smile at me on the first day."

 

"_Aww,"_ Pete coos. Spencer flushes to the roots of his hair.

 

"I still can't believe you never told me about this," he mutters.

 

Brendon cocks his head, laughing a little. Around them, everyone seems to be watching them both with sudden interest. "I thought you _knew,_" he says, spreading his hands helplessly. "I was seriously not subtle, Spence. I stuttered. I blushed. I gazed soulfully. I...sort of figured that's why you were kind of weird around me at first, actually, which—you know, fair enough, really. I was an annoying little fucker, although in my defense, I'd never actually _been _in love before, and it took me a while to get better about dealing with it."

 

"You got better?" Ryan inquired dryly.

 

Brendon snorts, flipping him off. "Fuck you, I got better. A few months in, I could have whole conversations with him and everything. With real sentences, even, and actual eye contact." He beams. "I was very proud."

 

"You—" Spencer should let it drop. He _should._ He can't. "You _thought I knew?_ And...what? I just wasn't doing anything about it? Just letting you hang like that? Are you—are you serious—?"

 

Brendon smiles again, uncertainly, a curious tilt to his head. "Well..._yeah,"_ he says reasonably. "I mean, what else were you supposed to do? Oh, my god." He sits up, looking at Pete in sudden horror. "He didn't know. Jesus, thank god—what if he'd tried to _talk to me about it?"_

 

Pete cringes. "Yeah, no, I think I'd have had to kill myself if Patrick had ever—" He shudders. "Holy fuck."

 

"Hey—" Spencer objects, but cuts himself off abruptly, because what is he going to say? _Maybe I'd have said yes? _  He wouldn't have, and Brendon knows it, so it probably _is _a good thing he hadn't known. It just——

 

It just seems so sad. That Brendon could have...felt like that, all that time, and just never even _tried._ Never even had the slightest hope that there might be a chance.

 

And Spencer had been oblivious. How many times did he hurt Brendon, and never even know it? Four years is a long time. Spencer feels a little sick.

 

"I had a secret crush once," Jon says suddenly, and Spencer is grateful when all eyes in the room immediately turn away from him and Brendon.

 

"_Really,"_ Ryan says, and there is something in the quirk of his mouth that makes Spencer think he already knows about this, too, and is intrigued by Jon's decision to admit to it now. "Who was this?"

 

Jon shoots him a wry look, confirming Spencer's suspicion, but doesn't seem particularly abashed as he admits, "Brendon."

 

Brendon gasps. "You did _not!"_

 

"Totally did," Jon confesses solemnly. "Three insane weeks. It was a very serious mancrush, I questioned my whole sexuality and everything." 

 

Brendon bursts out laughing. "And I _missed _it? Mother_fuck._"

 

"Man," Pete says admiringly. "You guys are better than daytime TV. Spencer? Now's your chance to reveal your secret passion for Ryan. Ryan, tell us all about the years you've spent pining for Jon."

 

"Unfortunately for you, my life is tragically pine-free," Ryan returns, throwing a pencil at Pete. "I've been too busy offering shoulders to cry on as my bandmates suffer through their unrequited loves and sexual identity crises. There was very little time to moon."

 

Pete makes a Wentzface, and Jon cuts in. "To be fair, I wasn't actually your bandmate at the time, and the Brendon thing was an anomaly. You make it sound like I do this a lot."

 

Brendon snorts. "No, but I did. I probably kept him busy enough for both of us."

  
Spencer can't quite help the betrayed look he shoots at Ryan right then—the fucker knew all along and never said a word, Jesus Christ—but Ryan just smiles back, unperturbed.

 

"Spencer?" Pete tries expectantly. "Any tragic pining? Secret crushes? Hidden desires you'd like to share with the class?"

 

There aren't, and it's stupid, but somehow saying "No," feels like some kind of dig at Brendon, so Spencer just rolls his eyes and says nothing.

 

It's _stupid._ He should just let the whole fucking Brendon-thing go. _Brendon _obviously has, and it's not like it changes anything. It changes nothing. There's nothing _to _change, it's not even current information. It's ancient history by now.

 

The conversation moves on around him, and Spencer lets his head fall back, staring at the ceiling and trying to ignore what feels like butterflies stirring to life in his stomach.

 

It changes nothing.

 

—

 

 

The problem, as Spencer sees it, is that it feels like knowing _should _change something. But there's nothing left to change now, so his brain has developed this disturbing habit of obsessing over all the ways in which things might have changed back _then, _and taking innocuous little memories and _twisting _them, playing them over and over in Spencer's head like a movie reel.

 

It's driving him fucking nuts.

 

_"I think that's enough for today,"_ _Ryan says as practice winds to a close. Brendon is obviously exhausted, and he still seems more than a little bit uncomfortable with the whole lead-singer thing. Still, it's been a good day. Spencer can't help thinking, as he stands up from his kit and stiffly starts stretching his shoulder muscles out, that Brendon is probably the best thing that could have happened to this band. They might actually have a shot at making it someday, now, as crazy as that sounds._

 

_He looks up to find that Ryan and Brent have gone upstairs, leaving Brendon to finish putting away the guitars by himself. Brendon is a little bit obsessive-compulsive when it comes to taking care of instruments._

 

_Spencer goes over to help, smiling at Brendon because he's still riding the high of this sudden new burst of hope for a future, and he can't quite help himself._

 

_And that's when it happens. Maybe Brendon's breath catches in his throat a little. Maybe he looks at Spencer's mouth, blushes—how many times must that have happened? how many times did Spencer miss it?—but this time he doesn't miss it. This time he sees, and Brendon knows he sees, and for a minute there's an awkward silence in the air, a heavy pause full of possibilities, both good and bad._

 

_Spencer's straight, right, so maybe he flushes, takes a half-step back without meaning to. Maybe Brendon flinches and a painful blush spreads over his cheeks, and he won't look at Spencer anymore, and maybe he trips over himself a little in his hurry to get away. And Spencer, he wouldn't know what to say, how to fix it, and he'd have to watch helplessly as Brendon runs away, his eyes pinched at the corners and his cheeks washed pale with mortification, and maybe Brendon will stop coming to practice after that, will start making excuses to avoid Spencer—to avoid all of them—and then one day they'll be forced to acknowledge that he just isn't coming back. And even though he's only been in the band a little while, he's already made himself indispensable by now, and how can they ever go back to what it was like before he came?_

 

_But._

 

_But what if Spencer doesn't back away? _

 

_He's straight, sure, but it's not like he's never wondered—Ryan Ross is his best friend, Spencer is not unfamiliar with the idea of flexible sexuality, okay—and maybe...maybe he doesn't back away after all. Maybe he blushes back, instead, and maybe he even glances at Brendon's mouth, because you don't have to be gay to have noticed that Brendon's got a pretty great mouth for glancing at, and maybe Brendon sees him glancing and then suddenly all the tension in the room is sort of...different, somehow. Maybe they're both looking now, and they both know it, and maybe one of them moves forward a little—maybe it's even Spencer—and then...then they'd be kissing._

 

_And God, that would probably be weird, right, but—well. Brendon's mouth, you know, so even if it's weird it's probably also kind of amazing, and as long as it doesn't go any further than that—not now—then Spencer will probably be okay. Better than okay, because it's Brendon so it's not like he's going to push, and probably he doesn't have much more experience at this than Spencer, not at this point, so they're kind of learning all this together, which is sort of awesome to think about._

 

_Maybe it works. For what it is, at least, maybe it works. Maybe it becomes their secret, just for now, because they're both really nervous and still learning and God, Ryan will flip the fuck out if he thinks they're going to fuck up his band, so they keep it a secret just between them, and maybe that's kind of fun, too. There could be stolen kisses after practice, and sneaking over to each others' houses sometimes without inviting the other guys, and by now the kissing thing has probably progressed to making out, and that's awesome, too. They're totally taking it slow, because this is the kind of thing you don't rush into, not with your friend, not with the guy in your band—your band that might actually make it someday—so they're taking it slow, but not too slow. They do a little grinding, maybe, Spencer's pretty sure he'd be okay with a little grinding, and of course they're in high school so maybe they even come that way, they come together just from kissing and grinding and God, he gets to see what Brendon looks like when he comes, that'd be—_

 

"—Spencer, seriously, what the _fuck?"_ 

 

Spencer snaps his attention back to the road, only to discover that he's in the middle of cruising right past their exit, and Ryan is shooting him an extremely weird look from the passenger seat.

 

Spencer flushes deeply, and turns his attention back to the road. He turns the radio up a little higher and refuses to look in Ryan's direction.

  
Christ. He's got to stop thinking about this shit. It's not real, it never happened, and he's going to drive himself up the fucking wall if he doesn't get his head on straight.

 

"Seriously, are you okay?" Ryan asks him, over the sound of the stupid Top-40 shit that's blasting out of the speakers.

 

Spencer doesn't know the answer, so he doesn't bother to reply.

 

—

 

Everything is weird now.

 

It shouldn’t be, and probably nobody else even notices that it _is—_probably it’s only weird in Spencer’s head_—_but that doesn’t change the fact that it's weird.

 

It’s weird in little ways, like how Spencer is suddenly intensely aware of Brendon’s location in any room, especially when he happens to be sitting close to Spencer, or how Brendon’s eyes on him feel..._heavier, _against his skin, than anyone else's. It's weird in big ways, like how Spencer has started avoiding his friends—especially Brendon, which is difficult since he's currently living _in Brendon's house—_out of irrational fear that they're going to somehow look at him and just know everything he can't stop thinking about.

 

Well. Maybe that's not a _totally _irrational fear, at least where Ryan is concerned, but it still doesn't make it okay.

 

It's just _weird._ Spencer feels like his skin doesn't fit right anymore, like he's somehow slipped out of rhythm with himself and can't find his way back on beat. It isn't supposed to be like this, knowing shouldn't make this much of a difference, but it does, and it _is, _and it...

 

It just isn't supposed to be like this.

 

_—_

 

Spencer can't sleep.

 

It's been over a week since the bomb dropped, and it hasn't stopped messing him up inside yet.  He's been laying here for thirty minutes already, desperately trying to fall asleep, but he just can't turn his brain off. He keeps thinking about the night Brendon came out to him. He wonders if Brendon had been trying, that night. He wonders what he would have done if Brendon had tried harder, or if Spencer had been more perceptive, or...something. Something. Brendon was already in love with him by then, if he's telling the truth about his feelings; he'd been with the band long enough that he would have been past that first puppy-crush phase. And he'd come out, he'd looked Spencer in the eye and admitted to liking boys, and maybe he was hoping, at least a little. Maybe he was sitting there with his heart practically hanging off his sleeve, and Spencer hadn’t _noticed_, and God, he's just so fucking stupid sometimes.

 

He's doing it again, that thing where his brain keeps trying to rewrite history. He's doing it again, and he can't even help it.

 

_They're on tour, their first real tour, and it's a hotel night. The shine still hasn't faded on that particular luxury yet, and tonight Spencer is rooming with Brendon. The beds are huge and soft and, by comparison with their bunks on the bus, feel like heaven. Spencer is cleaner than he's felt in days, and the air smells heavy with shampoo and shaving cream and soap-scented shower steam, and everything is right with the world._

_  
They're a little drunk, not really drunk, but a little bit giddy and still kind of high from the show. Spencer is teasing Brendon about the girl outside the venue, the one who started crying when Brendon smiled at her and said hello as they passed, and Brendon is blushing, and he just kind of blurts it out:_

 

_"I actually was sort of...looking at the guy. That she was with? The—her older brother, I think, or whatever. I kind of. Thought he was...hot. Hotter. Than she was." He looks practically paralyzed with fear._

 

_Spencer shrugs. "Whatever floats your boat, dude."_

 

_What really happens now is that Brendon starts to backtrack, makes a lot of frantic promises that he still likes girls, too—that he isn't really gay, because he totally dates girls and likes it, it's just that he maybe might like dating boys too, and he's so clearly uncertain about whether or not this is actually okay that Spencer spends the next twenty minutes explaining about Ryan's summer fling with the boy from the checkout counter at the grocery store, and by the end of it they're both laughing so hard that Spencer, at least, has practically forgotten that the conversation started with Brendon kind of coming out._

 

_But maybe it doesn't have to end there. Maybe it isn't supposed to. Maybe Brendon pushes, just a little. He's probably a little shy about it, so he doesn't say anything too direct. But maybe he asks if Spencer's ever thought a boy was hot. Maybe he holds his breath a little while he waits for the answer._

 

_And the thing is, Spencer wouldn't even think about it, he'd just say 'no,' because he's straight, and fuck, now he's broken Brendon's heart right to his face and he's still too fucking clueless to fucking know it, and maybe it's worse than that, even, because maybe Brendon doesn't do a very good job of hiding his reaction and maybe that's when Spencer figures it out. And God, now they're just staring at each other, or they would be if Brendon could bring himself to even look at Spencer anymore, and Spencer probably starts stuttering and says something epically stupid, something about being fucking sorry or some shit, and Christ, Brendon is probably so sick inside and—_

 

_Except, maybe it doesn't have to go like that, either. Maybe in this version of reality, Spencer actually has half a brain, and figures out the right thing to say—whatever the fuck that might be—and maybe that's the end of it right then, because Brendon isn't ready to confess to everything at once and Spencer's been kind of broadsided, here, so they just watch some other stupid movie and eventually they fall asleep._

 

_And maybe everything goes on just like normal, and they never talk about it directly or ever deal with it again, but Spencer is a little more careful of Brendon's feelings, and at least he knows he doesn't ever hurt him carelessly, and maybe that's okay._

 

_Or maybe Spencer looks at Brendon a little differently, after that. Maybe he looks, and maybe he starts thinking what-if-what-if, and maybe there comes a day when he stops thinking "what-if" and starts thinking "maybe," and maybe there comes a day when he stops thinking "maybe" and starts thinking "yes." And maybe it works, and maybe it doesn't, and maybe—_

 

God. Spencer is never going to get any fucking sleep.

 

—

   
 

Spencer doesn't much like Sarah.

 

It's not that there's anything wrong with her, exactly. She's funny, and quirky, and actually kind of awesome, and she seems to think Brendon pretty much hung the moon, which is basically exactly as it should be, and she makes Brendon smile a lot. She was a lot of fun to hang with at Disneyland.

 

Spencer just...doesn't _like _her.

 

He begs off of joining them for dinner and goes to bed early, and flatly refuses to think too much about any of the reasons why. He calls Haley instead, because he hasn't spoken to her in almost two weeks outside the occasional text or email. It happens; they've both been busy.

 

They talk for maybe half an hour. Spencer wonders with a vague sort of dissatisfaction when, exactly, they started having so little to talk about. 

  
She asks him how Brendon is doing, and what's new in all of their lives.

 

Spencer tells her, "Nothing new to report."

 

—

 

 

_—maybe it happens in Maryland, maybe it’s Ryan who starts it all. Ryan and Brendon are fighting all the time, and—years of friendship or no, Spencer can admit it—it’s almost always Ryan in the wrong. Ryan is a bitch when he’s wrong._

 

_So maybe he’s pissed at Brendon, one of those times when nobody even understands what the fuck he’s actually pissed about, and probably Ryan doesn’t really either, and Brendon is taking the brunt of it because that’s just how it works, and maybe this time, Ryan goes too far._

 

_“If you weren’t so busy daydreaming about Spencer, maybe you’d have a fucking clue!”_

 

_And Spencer is shocked, obviously he’s shocked, but that’s nothing compared to Brendon. Brendon probably looks like he’s been punched in the face, God, his secret is out right there in front of everybody, in front of Spencer. And maybe it doesn’t even matter what Spencer does then, because Brendon can’t forgive Ryan for that, not when he’s been trying so hard to be everything they want him to be, and he’s left his family and taken a crappy job and a shithole apartment and he’s given up everything for this, and then maybe he just leaves, maybe it ruins everything and they all go home, and they never ever know how close they actually came to making it—_

 

_—_

 

"Hey," says Brendon. He's hovering in the door of Spencer's bedroom.

 

Spencer looks up from his laptop. His stomach dissolves into the ether, and he prays his face isn't turning pink. "Hey."

 

Brendon makes a face at him for no good reason, and Spencer grins in spite of himself.

 

"You're such a dork," he says.

 

"It's a gift," Brendon agrees cheerfully. "Shane called. We are ordered to be in the living room in fifteen minutes, and the table is to be set for four with our very finest china."

 

Spencer snorts. "Our finest paper china?"

 

"What kind of person do you think I am?" Brendon sniffs haughtily. "I'm breaking out the plastic party plates, baby. _And _our very classiest cans of beer."

 

Just like that, it's suddenly easy to be with Brendon again—easy, and normal, and fun. Spencer is laughing without even meaning to, laughing for no real reason beyond relief. He doesn't like staying away from Brendon. He doesn't like everything feeling heavy and too-big and _wrong._

 

"Our classiest cans of beer, huh? I kinda feel like maybe I should dress up or something."

 

Brendon grins at him, beaming and happy and bright, and Spencer's stomach maybe kind of dissolves again, just a little bit.

 

Yeah, okay. Maybe _normal _was an overstatement.

 

"We should get you a bed," Brendon muses thoughtfully, out of nowhere.

 

They both turn and look at Spencer's air mattress. It's a very nice air mattress. Deluxe model. Spencer has no real complaints. He never meant to actually _stay._ Still doesn't mean to, still thinks of this as temporary, even though he has no real plans to leave.

 

Brendon doesn't say anything else, and he doesn't look away from his contemplation of the air mattress, but there's something faintly expectant about the set of his shoulders.

 

"Yeah," Spencer hears himself say. "We probably should."

 

Brendon smiles.

 

—

 

Shane and Regan burst through the door in a flurry of Thai takeout containers and unbridled glee.

 

"We totally eloped!" Regan yells, waving her left hand around and nearly flinging noodles everywhere.

 

"You—_what?"_ Brendon is trying to beam and scowl at the same time, and the resulting expression is fairly hilarious. Spencer, for his part, isn't quite sure what to think. Mostly, he's just kind of shocked.

 

"Eloped," Shane confirms. Upon closer inspection, he maybe appears a tiny bit wild around the eyes, but in a happy way, so. Whatever.

 

Brendon finally seems to settle on one primary reaction, which is to start flinging himself indiscriminately around the room hugging people and whooping at the top of his lungs. Spencer himself gets three of them, and wonders a little desolately whether Brendon has always been so...warm and solid and _Brendon-_shaped in his arms. Christ, he's such a mess.

 

"Congratulations!" Spencer finally manages to tell them both, when they've situated themselves around the table. Brendon is next to him. Spencer is obsessively, ridiculously aware of the place where their knees are touching.

 

Regan beams at him. "It's awesome, right? We just—I don't even know, it was just like, 'Let's do it!' and then...then we did!"

 

"I can't believe you didn't even invite _us,_" Brendon complains for the fourteenth time. Besides the hugging and whooping, this has been the most prominent of his feelings on the matter.

 

"Well, the point of eloping is kind of that you don't invite people," Shane points out mildly, and then there is a very long conversation about throwing an after-the-fact reception, which Shane is only in favor of if they get to call it a "party" instead of a "reception," and _then _there is a very long conversation about Shane moving out of the house and in with Regan, except _actually _they'll be moving into a new place Regan's had her eye on for quite awhile now but hasn't told anybody about, and before Spencer knows it, it's nearing eleven and Shane and Regan are gleefully taking their leave to go to a hotel for the night, mostly because Shane wants to see what a honeymoon suite actually looks like.

 

Regan hugs Spencer goodbye at the door, and as she pulls away, she smirks at him. "When is it gonna be your turn, do you think?" she asks teasingly. "Any prospects for a ring on Haley's finger?"

 

Spencer swallows thickly, and lets them all laugh at him for all the wrong reasons. He excuses himself to his room before Shane and Regan are even all the way out the door.

 

 

—

_Maybe there isn't any one thing that sparks it at all. Maybe it doesn't have to be some big confession, maybe it doesn't have to be a "moment." _

 

_Maybe somewhere along the line, Spencer just opens his fucking eyes, and maybe he sees what's in front of his fucking face, and maybe he actually does something about it before it's too fucking late._

 

Maybe he's fucked.

 

—

 

 

He breaks up with Haley over the phone.

 

It's a dick move, and if he had any class at all—or thought he could stand to look her in the eye without throwing up all over himself—he would totally have booked a flight and done it like a man, but. Well. 

 

He breaks up with Haley over the phone.

 

She takes it...better than he'd had any right to expect, truthfully, and maybe they've been falling apart for awhile and he just hasn't wanted to face it, but it still seems like there should be more tears and recriminations. 

 

He spends the rest of the day hiding in his room, which is not even strictly necessary, since Brendon is out surfing with Sarah or something. He wants to call Ryan and pour his stupid heart out, but he can't bring himself to do it.

 

The irony of it all is killing him. 

 

When Brendon gets home—thankfully without Sarah—Spencer finally emerges from his isolation. He says, "Were you serious about how maybe we should get me a bed?"

 

Brendon glances up from his phone, where he is busy Twittering about the waves or whatever-the-fuck. "Yeah," he says slowly. He looks like he can't decide whether to be excited or concerned. "Everything okay?"

 

"Haley and I broke up."

 

"Oh, shit." Brendon is around the couch and hugging Spencer before Spencer even really has a chance to notice him moving, and Spencer knows he's only digging the hole deeper for himself—why the fuck would he think it's a good idea to stay _here, _with Brendon?—but he just closes his eyes and breathes in deep and tries not to think too much about the way the salt water smell clings to Brendon's skin.

 

—

 

 

He buys himself a bed from Ikea, and a dresser, and a nightstand. His parents agree to box up what's left of his life in Vegas for him and stick it in storage or send it to him, whatever he decides to do. Right now, he decides not to decide.

 

Shane moves out, and Spencer "moves in," and it's probably a mistake and he damn well knows it. He just...doesn't want to leave.

 

—

 

_Maybe they get drunk. Maybe Sarah runs off with some other young, rich, famous guy, and Brendon's not too hurt because they haven't really been together long, and it's not like he's really in love with her yet. So he's not too hurt, but it stings, and Spencer is a good friend, so he buys the booze._

 

_Ryan and Jon aren't there, because—whatever, they're off hiking in the wilderness or visiting fucking Chicago, who even cares—but so it's just Brendon and Spencer and they're kind of smashed but not to that point where you're really out of your head. Just heavily buzzed with a side of giggly, and maybe Spencer says, "She wasn't good enough for you, anyway."_

 

_And maybe Brendon says, "Yeah, but she was the first person I've really liked this much since I got over...the thing with you, you know," and then Spencer takes a deep breath and says, "Well, maybe the problem is that you got over it too soon."_

 

_And whatever, that's cheesy as fuck, but it doesn't matter what he says, because the point is Brendon looks at him and gets it, and then maybe he kisses Spencer or maybe Spencer kisses him, and they're kind of drunk so it's okay that it gets really out of control really fast. _

 

_They start grinding—Spencer thinks maybe he could turn out to be a big fan of grinding—and maybe there's even a little groping, and maybe Brendon starts breathing really heavy when he's all turned on, or moaning, whatever, it only matters that he wants it, that he's hard and he's noisy and it's hot as fuck. _

 

_And maybe Spencer is the one to take it further than that, maybe he reaches in between them and gets Brendon's pants undone, and then there's a cock in his hand and fuck, that's probably weird, but kind of mind-blowingly hot, too, especially if he can watch Brendon's face while he does it, can see everything he's doing to him, and Spencer probably isn't ready for blowjobs quite yet but maybe Brendon will fuck his hand a little, his head thrown back and his mouth kind of open so Spencer can stretch up and lick into it, kiss him breathless while he jerks him off until Brendon comes, comes all over Spencer's hand and his stomach and—_

 

Spencer rolls over, burying his face in his pillow, and tries to stop thinking.

 

Yeah. He's totally fucked.

 

—

 

He doesn't actually plan to say anything about it. _Ever._ It isn't something that he's even consciously thought about, that's how seriously not-planned the whole thing is.

 

When it happens, it goes something like this:

 

Brendon is standing in the kitchen in a pair of faded, baggy Spongebob Squarepants pyjama bottoms. He's shirtless and crazy-haired and scratching aimlessly at the back of his neck while he stares into the refrigerator with an expression of sleepy incomprehension.

 

Spencer stands in the doorway of the kitchen for a minute, and then suddenly he's just...talking.

 

"Four years is a long time," he hears himself saying, as if from somewhere far away. 

 

Brendon looks over, and his expression clears slightly, and then does something complicated that Spencer can't quite follow.

 

It doesn't matter.

 

"I keep thinking about it," he continues. "It's like I can't think of anything else anymore. Four years, and you never said a word, and I didn't know, and now my brain won't let go of—I don't know. All the ways it could have gone differently, I guess. Good ones. Bad ones. Just...it would have been different. If I'd known. I can't go back in time and fix it, and I can't promise I wouldn't have fucked it up, but—I would have _known, _and maybe.... Anyway, it's—I know you're...you've moved on, you don't. Feel that way anymore. And I know you're with Sarah, and she's awesome for you, and I don't. I'm not trying to fuck things up between us. I just. I don't want to be that guy, you know? I don't want four years to go by, and me never have told you, and to always wonder what might have happened if you'd known."

 

Brendon hasn't moved. He's just staring at Spencer, the refrigerator door still open and his eyes so dark Spencer can't read anything in them at all.   It's suddenly a little hard to breathe.

 

"So this is me...telling you," Spencer finishes lamely. "Don't—you don't have to say anything, or. I don't _expect _anything from you, and I'm going to go to Ryan's today and when I come back, we don't ever even have to mention it again. I just." He shrugs, awkwardly. "I just wanted you to know."

 

He turns and leaves the kitchen, grabbing his keys off the entry table with shaking hands, and slips out the door before Brendon has to watch him have a nervous breakdown right there in the front hall.

 

Brendon is still standing motionless in front of the open refrigerator when Spencer gently shuts the door behind him.

 

—

 

 

"The thing is," says Brendon's voice, shakily, from somewhere behind Spencer a few hours later. 

 

Spencer doesn't turn around. _Can't _turn around. He doesn't think he's even breathing anymore.

 

"The thing is," Brendon says again. "That 'moved on' is such a _strong _word. Like. It sort of implies falling _out _of love with someone, and that's...maybe kind of an exaggeration. For me. With...with you."

 

It feels like it takes a very long time for Spencer to get his head together enough to shift a squirming Hobo out of his lap and push himself to his feet. He turns around, his pulse racing a million miles an hour.

 

Brendon is standing just outside the back door of Ryan's house. He looks uncharacteristically small and vulnerable, his eyes enormous and his hands twisted awkwardly together.

 

"I'm sorry it took me so long to get here," he says in a sudden rush, as Spencer starts walking toward him. Everything feels a little dream-like, suddenly. "I had to...there was Sarah, and things weren't really _serious _or anything with us, but I still didn't want to—start this with that hanging out there, you know? And God, I hope I'm not making a fool of myself right now, and that I was really understanding you right this morning, because, like. I was kind of only half-awake, and for a little while I wondered if I was maybe dreaming the whole thing, so if I was and I'm an idiot it'd be awesome if you could tell me now, because there happens to be this cliff handy and I could seriously just jump right off—"

 

Spencer lifts his hands up, bracing one on Brendon's hip and sliding the other around the back of his head, threading his fingers through Brendon's hair.

  
Brendon shuts up.

 

And the thing is, Spencer kind of—has no idea what he's doing. It's not just the whole kissing-a-guy thing, it's the whole kissing-_Brendon_ thing, and it's pretty much a bigger deal than anything he's ever done, and there's this frozen, terrified moment that seems to stretch out for all of time where they're just _standing _there like that, and Spencer knows he's supposed to kiss him—_wants_ to kiss him, more than anything—but is all at once sort of...physically unable to just do it.

 

"Wow, if you don't do something pretty soon, I'm pretty sure I'm going to actually explode," confesses Brendon in a weak whisper, and then Spencer is laughing and suddenly kissing him is the easiest thing in the world.

 

It isn't exactly fireworks and swelling music. Actually, it's kind of more like a slobbery dog drooling all over their feet, and the sound of Jon and Ryan clapping solemnly in the background, because they are assholes, and Brendon ends up bursting into giggles halfway through it, and then Hobo makes a particularly enthusiastic leap at their kneecaps and Spencer almost falls on his ass.

  
It's still the best fucking kiss of his entire life.

 

He pushes his forehead against Brendon's when they break apart, and they stare at each other from three-quarters of an inch away.

 

"I'm sorry for every stupid thing I said or did during those four years," Spencer tells him, painfully sincere. His heart still clenches every time he thinks about it.

 

Brendon smiles, so bright it's almost blinding. "I'm sorry for every stupid thing I _didn't _say or do," he counters. "I'm glad you were smarter than I was."

 

"This is all very touching," Ryan puts in dryly from the back door. "But I'm developing diabetes just _watching _this crap. Maybe you two could take this back to your _own _house and out of our faces?"

 

Spencer flips him off without looking away from Brendon, and is gratified by the sound of Jon's fist connecting with some portion of Ryan's body.

 

"I'm not...necessarily _opposed _to the idea of taking this back to our own house, though," Brendon says carefully, watching Spencer closely for a reaction.

 

Spencer thinks about being alone in the house with Brendon, thinks of all the fantasies he's been drowning himself in, and dives back in helplessly for another kiss.

 

"Fuck, yes," he says, when they finally break for air. "Let's go home."

 

—

 


End file.
